Trim panels for the bodies of motor vehicles are known. They serve to visually and aerodynamically bridge gaps between different outer skin parts of the body. In addition, they serve as support structure for functional components such as for example a seal. A typical application example is the pillar panel, which covers the load-bearing bodywork parts of the A, B, C or D-pillar. Another example is the frame-like trim panel in the region of the windscreen opening of the body.
The requirements on trim panels, in particular on the surface quality on the outside, i.e. the visible side, are very high because of their function which co-shapes the vehicle outside, visually. A very high surface quality is demanded, wherein the surface is to be additionally embodied to be impact and scratch resistant as well as weather and aging-resistant. Apart from this, the material of the trim panel must be employable over a large temperature range and must only have minor temperature-related distortion values. On the other hand, ductile-elastic characteristics are demanded for certain functions, namely in particular, where the material interacts with the body, for example in order to realize snap hooks, which are to resiliently engage behind the vehicle body or of regions, into which the thread-shaping or thread-cutting screws are to cut.
For the aforementioned reasons, trim panels were developed in the past, which are produced from thermoplastics by a multi-component injection molding method. There, the portions of the trim panels located towards the non-visible side, which frequently have a load-bearing function, are produced from a sufficiently ductile material such as for example from ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene). By contrast, the portions located on the visible side of the trim panels are produced from a material which makes possible a very high surface quality (“class A”) even without reworking. Used for example is a PMMA (polymethylmethacrylate).
Such a construction however requires a high material strength of the trim panel, which in particular is due to the sufficiently known restrictions of the thermoplastic injection molding. Added to this is that in the case of cross-sectional chunks or material accumulations in the injection-molded trim panels, such as are typical for example in the region of the attachments of stiffening ribs, it has to be ensured with elaborate measures that as a consequence of the higher absolute shrinkage during the cooling of the material at this location with material accumulation, no subsidence locations develop on the surface of the visible side directed to the outside.
Starting out from this prior art, the invention is based on the object of providing a trim panel for the body of a motor vehicle, with which the disadvantages described above can be largely eliminated. In particular, the trim panel may include a design-appropriate embodiment preferably without production-related restrictions and has high-quality visual characteristics and a low weight.